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Камінь. Біографічний роман. Книга друга. Непрості дороги до пекла: Виживання в умовах насильства.

Book by Володимир Шабля · 3 quotes · Soviet History, Ukraine, Ussr History

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Камінь. Біографічний роман. Книга друга. Непрості дороги до пекла: Виживання в умовах насильства. Quotes

“Bang!” The explosion thundered right beside him. Danilo’s body was thrown aside like a rag doll, and his mind shut down instantly. What happened next, Red Army soldier Shablia neither saw nor heard. The sounds of battle, the shouts of men, machine-gun fire, shell bursts — even the massive shockwave when the bridge and dam were blown up — could no longer reach his consciousness. Author: Volodymyr Shablia: Context note: This passage describes the moments of Danylo Shablia's last battle during the chaotic retreat of the Red Army, emphasizing the sudden, impersonal nature of events in World War II.”

“That’s how we’ve ended up,” Ivan said with a bitter smile. “We work, as in the proverb: Enough trading, father — there’s no change left to give. ‘Why did they suddenly increase the grain procurement plan?’ Vasyl protested. ‘Everything seems the same — but it isn’t,’ Danylo explained. ‘The status of our land has changed, and so has the status of the collective farmers. What grew last year is now taxed differently. Even the poor peasants who joined the collective are no longer considered poor — and the taxes rise accordingly.’ ‘Clever,’ Ivan muttered angrily. ‘They’ve laid out their accounting traps well.’ — Volodymyr Shablia, Stone. Book Two Context note: In Soviet collective farms, taxes and grain quotas were often increased not because of real agricultural growth, but due to bureaucratic reclassification. Accounting became a tool of pressure that made normal farming impossible.”

“Peter had only just graduated with honors from the Zaporizhzhia Pedagogical Institute and was supposed to leave for his first teaching job the very next day. Instead, he was arrested. For what sins was a student obsessed with honesty punished — a young man who had risen from the very bottom of society and sincerely believed in the socialist ideal? His parents did not know. Peter himself did not know either. He believed what had happened was a terrible mistake and hoped it would soon be corrected. — Volodymyr Shablia, Stone. Book Two Context note: In the Stalinist USSR, arrests often struck young, loyal, and idealistic citizens. Many believed their detention was a bureaucratic error — until the machinery of repression proved otherwise.”